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From Zero to Hero: How Phil Spencer Is Re-innovating Gaming on Xbox One

Phil Spencer's eyes are set on the future rather than the past, and that's exactly where his aim needs to be.

By Dustin MurphyPublished 6 years ago 5 min read
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Three years ago it was a difficult moment when we began to watch former Xbox head-honcho Don Mattrick took the stage to unveil the future of Xbox with the Xbox One. Don Mattrick was the figure-head that had set the Xbox 360 on its road to success as it was in a race to the finish line. A race that Sony just couldn't keep up with until recent, but now that has changed under the new face of Xbox with Phil Spencer steering the ship into a close second.

It's no secret that Xbox One has been struggling over the course of three years. With studio closures, game cancellations, and third party exclusives slowly being peeled away; it's a heartbreaking ordeal to consider if you're a fan of the Xbox. However, that's not all doom and gloom for Phil Spencer. His approach is one of integrity, inclusiveness, and not forgetting the roots of which drove Xbox to its success for almost a decade. For Phil Spencer, his eyes are set on the future rather than the past, and that's exactly where his aim needs to be.

If there's anything I can heavily admire about Phil Spencer, it's his idea that games aren't just relics are the past. It's that games are also the fundamental shaping of what we see today and that importance shouldn't tarnish with age. Those games need to be enjoyed and still are by many fans. It was just at E3 2017 that he had stated to Gamespot's Jeff Gertsmann (you can watch the interview above) during an interview. There's no doubt that seeing the OG Xbox games will be a big deal for fans who've been playing their Xbox 360 games on the Xbox One. I sure as heck have been and had it not been for the push that Phil Spencer made; there's a chance it likely wouldn't be there right now.

His vision of bringing even classic games to the Xbox One is something the Xbox 360 attempted to do, but simply couldn't handle what the games needed, and thus the emulation of those games drastically failed. Now with the current hardware(s) now in the market, he's openly approached the idea with arms wide open, and has stated it's a very real thing. It's real enough that we will be seeing it sooner than later once the emulation software has been perfected for us fans to use. Thanks to the power of the Xbox One X and Phil Spencer's teams at Microsoft, we have a lot to look forward to.

His Vision of the Future is Bright. Xbox One X is Only the Beginning.

Courtesy: Microsoft

Lets face it. We all know the future seems grim for the time being. We have very few exclusives to look forward to outside of indie games and early access titles through the 'Xbox Preview Program'. Trust me, I'm right there with you, and there's no doubt that I've been scratching my head at the few games we do have. There's so few of them out there, that we are kinda growing bored. We can only do so many Warzone battles in Gears of War 4 before our jaws begin to slack with frustration or boredem. We can only go through so many SWAT matches on Halo 5: Guardians before our brains begin to rot

But wait. That's not all. What we do have is something the PlayStation 4 hasn't had under Jim Ryan. We have the ability to now play games such as #Minecraft and #RocketLeague with our friends on PC and Nintendo Switch. It's even been stated that Phil Spencer hopes to see more games do so in the future, which could very well set games such as Call of Duty, Star Wars: Battlefront II, and Battlefield up for a future where we can shoot out our differences. Sure PlayStation 4 has been doing this with a select few games, but the scope of that vision has been skewed by a select few games; not the entire future of gaming with the Xbox One family.

How Phil Spencer's Vision Can Change Gaming as We Know it Now

Courtesy: Microsoft

I know, I know, I know. You are wondering how I, a PlayStation 4 fan, can be saying the things I do. It's considered heresy among the elitist gamers within the PS4 fanbase, but let me honestly admit this. Microsoft has done a lot to bring the Xbox One as a centerpiece to your multi-media enjoyment. They've been unashamed in their attempts to alter how we perceive gaming. Phil Spencer just happens to be a guy that shares that vision.

Sure we can laugh at him all we want, but lets be real. We've been shafted a few times by Andrew House and Jim Ryan about the topics of backwards compatibility as well as cross-play with Xbox as well as Nintendo. Their reasons are on security, but we already game with PC. That alone should be raising some red flags here. They've even shafted the PlayStation Vita like it was a joke. They didn't even bat an eye to keep it alive, they just let it die, and it shows due to the support being third party only.

Except that isn't Sony's focus. They are focusing on PlayStation 4 with 4K gaming and VR, which is great. Phil's vision is one that is irrefutably more suitable for some of us that prefer not to have VR being a primary view. We can enjoy his idea of what games will be without things such as VR being a primary view. We can enjoy the games that we used to love without being limited by hardware restrictions or platform restriction. His vision is one that many of us will take delight in while others shake their head. If anything proves true, it's that Phil Spencer is a gamer at heart. Phil Spencer is one that takes gaming seriously just as we do. With that being said, lets game on, and discuss what we hope to see.

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About the Creator

Dustin Murphy

A video games journalist and Content Creator. He has been featured on sites such as AppTrigger and MoviePilot. He's the president and editor-in-chief of the independent news publisher Blast Away the Game Review.

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